For New Zealand registered yachts wanting to leave NZ for overseas ports, there are quite a few requirements. To get official clearance the first thing you must get is a Category 1 Safety Certificate. In order to get your Cat 1 certificate the boat, its safety gear and the crew must be inspected to determine that people are not likely to come to grief, or that if they do, they’re properly prepared to deal with most emergencies that could arise.

To satisfy the requirements for the Cat 1 certificate, many NZ cruisers will need to complete an Advanced Sea Survival course. We completed our course in January and the course material covered preparation of the boat and crew, fire fighting, flooding, weather, medical issues as well as abandoning ship and taking to a liferaft. Probably the most useful part of the course were the practical wet drills which included jumping into a wave pool in full wet weather gear and climbing into an inflated liferaft (no easy task with an inflated lifejacket on).

Lets hope we don’t need to put any of this knowledge into effect …. Ever!